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I recently went to a spa for the first time. My wife and I were celebrating our wedding anniversary and decided to treat ourselves to a relaxing activity. So we booked an appointment at the Bonneville Hot Springs Resort & Spa in North Bonneville, Washington, which is about an hour away from Portland, Oregon.

I was greeted by an attendant, who described the bath treatment options I could take. I chose the alternating hot and cold bath. It consisted of alternating between sitting in a tub of hot water and a tub of cold water every few minutes, which according to google, stimulates the body to promote physical and emotional well-being and is called the Kneipp System. There was even a pitcher of water to drink and a bunch of grapes on a table beside the tubs. It doesn’t sound too bad, does it?

The hot water in the tub was supposed to be around 115 °F. How I handled it was pretty similar to how this guy did: (Note that the video is in Japanese but you won’t need a translator to figure out what’s going on)

The only difference was that there was no jiggling girl to motivate me to stay in the hot water. Most of the time, I sat at the edge of the tub with only my feet and ankles in the water, eating grapes and laughing quietly at how ridiculously hot it was.

I once stopped dating a girl after a mildly heated discussion about “Forget Paris”, a movie starring Billy Crystal and Debra Winger. The debate centered around whether or not a relationship is supposed to be hard work, as portayed in the movie.

I somehow held the opinion that relationships were supposed to be tough. I don’t actually remember why I thought this since at the time, I was only in my early 20’s and have only achieved several two-week-long relationships. In no way was I an expert on the subject. But I was naive and stubborn, which was a terrible combination for a healthy debate.

Coincidentally, the discussion occurred at the end of the second week of dating the girl. So was it really the movie that made me stop calling her?

Here’s a video of Jason Biggs looking for an answer to the question most guys dread:

I used to think that my college dorm room was tiny. The average dorm room is 200 square feet for two people. I thought it was amazing that two people could live in such a small space. Then I recently read a blog entry at Around the Sun about a woman who lives in an 84 square foot home. 84 square feet!

So it made me think that maybe I should consider simplifying my life a little. I’ll start out with only buying things I need.

Take, for example, this guy who bought something from QVC that he found to be very handy:

Back when I was in high school, girls placed a guy into one of four categories:

“Cute”: He was pretty much the guy who got away with anything. He set trends and never had problems getting dates on Saturday nights. His confidence was reinforced by the barrage of candygrams during Valentine’s Day. Some girls even pretended he was funny even though they were mainly laughing because he’s cute. Sometimes he was referred to as “sooo cute”.

“Funny”: He may not have been the best looking guy around, but he still managed to be surrounded by girls. He was charming and even his fellow guys respected him. Some of those who were referred to as “sooo funny” by the girls even made the jump to the “cute” category at times.

“Nice”: It was the category most guys dreaded falling into. He was the guy that girls ask about homework. He was the reliable lab partner. He was the guy that the other guys trust with their girlfriends. He sometimes was able to jump to the “funny” category, but almost never to the “cute” category.

“Who?”: He was not really placed in a category at all. In fact, girls rarely acknowledged him, and when they did, they referred to him as “that guy who…” (e.g. “that guy who wears that same unicorn t-shirt everyday”, “that guy who wears a cape”, or “that creepy guy who keeps smelling my hair in Algebra”)

Anyway, I found this short film on YouTube that illustrates the plight of the common “nice guy”.